Republicans are truly proving to be
a pain in the ass when it comes
to confirming Deb Haaland who was
chosen by Joe Biden to lead
the Interior Department.
She's actually a wonderful pick,
especially for this particular
post, but they find her views
against the use of fossil fuels
extreme, they've used that wording.
And now there are worries that even
Senator Joe Manchin, someone who
has been bought off by the fossil
fuel companies could also stand in
the way of her confirmation.
So Politico reported that Haaland,
a member of the Laguna Pueblo has
been a sharp critic of fossil fuel
development, a stance that has made
her nomination among the more
contentious of Biden's picks.
And she may also face tough
questioning from the democratic
Chair of the Energy and
Natural Resources Committee.
Senator Joe Manchin who is the most
pro fossil fuel Democrat.
Gee, I wonder why.
And let me be clear Politico didn't
get into details about this but
Joe Manchin has taken in a lot of
money from fossil fuel companies,
and that's what this story should
be about.
And I'll give you the specific
details on that in just a minute.
But the senators who are kind of
giving her a tough time right now
includes Senator Cynthia Lummis,
who is from Wyoming,
blasted Haaland's extreme views.
While senators Daines and Barrasso
called her radical and Daines even
suggested he would attempt to block
her nomination altogether.
And they cited her opposition to
the Keystone XL and
Dakota Access oil pipelines for why
they find her to be an extremist.
And as for Joe Manchin,
here's what we learned through
an NBC reporter who tweeted this.
Senator Joe Manchin is undecided on
Deb Haaland's nomination for
Interior Secretary, his spokeswoman
Sam Runyon tells LA Caldwell DC.
I don't know exactly who that is.
Manchin and Haaland have met to
discuss her nomination via Zoom but
Manchin is said to have remaining
questions.
And if you're wondering what those
remaining questions are or
what could be fueling
those remaining questions,
it could have to do with this.
Let's go to the last three
graphics here.
Manchin's primary campaign has
already begun fundraising and
clocked in with roughly $638,000
through the end of September.
Much of that cash came from PACs
affiliated with oil and
natural gas companies including
Valero Energy Corporation, Natural
Fuel Gas Company and DTE Energy,
which have long supported Manchin's
political career.
I'm not done yet.
There's more.
Since 2010,
the American Gas Association's PAC
has donated $15,000 to Manchin
according to the FEC.
In the same timeframe,
Exxon Mobil's corporate PAC
contributed $12,500 and
the American Petroleum Institute
contributed $10,000.
Some of you might be thinking,
well, that's not really
that much money.
But remember,
it doesn't take that much money to
buy off these politicians.
But there are some bigger figures
here.
For instance,
PACs and individuals affiliated
with FirstEnergy Corporation
are together one of Manchin's
biggest contributors and have given
the Senator $147,950 since 2009.
The American Chemistry Council,
whose members include companies
like Shell and
Exxon, spent $200,000 to support
Manchin in his 2018 campaign.
So Ryan I feel like no article I've
read about this really got into
the details about why Manchin would
stand in the way of Haaland getting
confirmed for this post,
but make no mistake about it.
It's about the fossil fuel money,
there's nothing else really
standing in her way of getting
confirmed here.
But what do you make of this?
And do you think that her
nomination can be squashed the way
that your attendance has been?
I mean, if it was squashed,
it would be squashed in a slightly
different way,
it wouldn't be because of who Neera
had become online and
references to her persona.
It would be much more ideological
and purely an assault by the fossil
fuel industry, on somebody that
they perceive as an opponent but
the irony is that Deb Haaland is,
yes, she's like in the mainstream
of the kind of democratic party at
this point when it comes to fossil
fuels.
Yes, she's against Keystone XL,
she's against Dakota Access,
so is the Biden Administration,
this is where the party has moved.
People have kind of foisted
on her this radical politics
that comes from being the first
Native American woman elected to
Congress next to Sharice Davids.
She won her primary before
Sharice Davids,
Sharice Davids became a new dem.
And so,
doesn't remotely compete for
kind of the online energy.
But Deb Haaland throughout a lot of
her political career was, let's
consider, pretty much a mainstream
democrat in her home state.
And so that really is going to make
it a lot more complicated for
Manchin to oppose her because
then it raises the question, well,
what's going on here?
She's only representing
the mainline democratic national
politics as we understand them
at this point.
So what is it about her that
you're coming after?
Now, one thing I think
a lot of people should remember and
might save them a lot of heartburn
over the next several months
is that when Manchin says
that he's undecided, it means that
he might blow everything up.
But it also might just mean that he
has some particular concessions
that he's trying to extract from
whatever situation that he's
injecting himself into.
And so what is it that he wants
from the Interior Department?
What does West Virginia want from
the Interior Department?
Generally, it's probably coal
related stuff.
And so, while he's saying that he's
undecided, he's definitely in
regular communication with Haaland
about what particular issues he
has in particular parts of West
Virginia that he wants resolved.
And I think reporters and
we'll monitor this.
If she does get confirmed, we'll
watch, what does West Virginia get
out of the Interior Department over
the next few months but
that's what politicians do.
When they're able to position
themselves as the key swing vote,
then in order to cast their vote
for somebody, they will say that
they're undecided for weeks.
They'll extract some big
concession, and
then they'll quietly vote yes.
And then they'll quietly receive
their concession, but then when it
comes to reelection time, they'll
remind all our voters, look what I
did for you in this particular area
with the interior department.
>> [LAUGH] It's just incredible.
And there are Republican senators
right now who are furious over
the fact that Haaland had tweeted
something about how republicans
don't seem to believe in science.
So the issue over tweets came up in
her confirmation as well.
But what always amazes me is how
sensitive not just Republican
lawmakers, I mean, I think
the Neera Tanden tweets story
really crystallized it for me.
And confirmed what I had already
suspected that you have these
lawmakers who are in these
incredible positions of power,
especially when you're
talking about the US Senate.
And they're not worried about near
attendance conflicts of interest is
someone who was the head of
the Center for American Progress
and took in money from all sorts of
clients that we find objectionable.
They don't have a problem with
that. That's totally fine.
But you hurt my feelings.
[LAUGH] >> Democrats, Republicans,
it doesn't even matter.
I mean, I would prefer for
the rejection or the objection to
be over ideological differences as
opposed to, my feelings were hurt,
I don't like what you're tweeting.
Who cares what they're tweeting
unless what they're tweeting is
a whole host of conspiratorial
claims which by the way,
some of these senators literally
repeat conspiratorial claims during
hearings.
We're going to get to that story
later with one republican senator
but I mean what do you make of all
that and does this set the tone
moving forward when it comes
to conduct online?
>> Well, it's an interesting
question is like, what are
the ideological differences between
a Manchin and a Neera Tanden?
Neera does fancy herself to be
a member of the progressive wing of
the party, she thinks that all
the other progressives are wrong
about everything that they do.
And she thinks
that the Democratic Party needs to
suffer conservatives like Manchin
in order to maintain its majority.
Over the years though, what
distinction actually is there then
between somebody who like Manchin
supports a particular set of ideas
and somebody like Tanden who says,
well, we have to support this
particular set of ideas, or else we
won't be able to be in government?
I mean, functionally none.
And so you see this amazing irony
of somebody who went to war with
the progressive wing of the party
in order to defend people like
Joe Manchin and
quite specifically Joe Manchin.
[LAUGH] And then
to have her nomination upended by
the person that she was defending.
And the person that she was going
to war [LAUGH] on his behalf.
And then you have all of these
other ridiculous arguments thrown
in but like Susan Collins said,
she was upset that Neera had
deleted tweets.
So on the one hand,
she gets nailed for the tweets, and
then Susan Collins nails her for
deleting the tweets because she
says that that is a violation of
the transparency [LAUGH] that
everybody needs to uphold.
And like you said it's all a giant
spectacle to distract from
the fact that this is a game that
each player is using for
his or her own purposes.
Like for Manchin, he had to hit
back at the Biden administration A,
for voting, he's going to vote for
the COVID relief package so
he feels like he needs to then do
something mean to Democrats to show
he's still Independent of
Democrats.
And Kamala Harris coming to
West Virginia and
appearing on the radio station.
He could have said, hey, you're
welcome to my state but he didn't.
He said, I wasn't told about this,
he made a big public fuss about it.
And so once he's made a public fuss
about it, then he has to hit back
by the rules of this machismo
politics that they all play by.
And so now he's looking around,
okay, well, how can I settle all of
these different scores?
And here comes Neera and Neera
presents this perfect opportunity,
because both Joe Biden and
Joe Manchin and everybody in
politics, even in the middle of
while they're sacking the Capitol,
or talking about the need for
unity and for chanting USA.
While they're
smashing the Capitol to pieces.
[LAUGH] >> Everybody rhetorically
believes in this spiritual notion.
And so what they can say is, look,
all of these tweets,
they're just so mean.
We can't cotton this,
this is not what we stand for.
And, There.
>> This is so perfect.
It's just so perfect.
It really is.
I mean, no,
I can't stand Joe Manchin for
a number of different reasons but
who would have thought that
Joe Manchin would kind of be
the hero in this very small,
not even a small story.
I mean, what you just mentioned
about the COVID relief bill,
I think you're right.
I think he's going to end up voting
in favor of the COVID relief bill.
I think that there's been
a sufficient amount
of pressure on him to do so.
But he really wants to
differentiate himself from others
in the Democratic Party and
one way to do that, well, pushing
this branding exercise of I do want
unity is to reject Neera Tanden.
So if we get a rejection of
Neera Tanden, and a yes vote on
the Coronavirus relief bill, great,
fantastic political calculation.
I'm all in.
Finally Joe Manchin does something
right. [LAUGH] >> Right and for
the left, it works out as long as
Neera's replacement is in her lane
or to her left.
And the person that they're talking
about, Gene Sperling for
Office of Management and Budget.
Yes, he's like a Clinton
wing person over the years but
he has very much drifted in a more
progressive direction economically
over the years.
And so, if Gene Sperling winds
up as the OMB Chief, rather than
Bruce Reed, who was the original
alternative to Neera Tanden,
then it really is a win win.